Thief's War: A Knight and Rogue Novel (14 page)

My shirt collar was open, so she’d already seen that I was in the same straits as she. When I ventured a “Good morning,” her lips twisted in an expression that was nothing like a smile.

“You don’t have to be circumspect, sir. They’d not care if you pulled me into the hall for a private chat right now. They know they have us.”

Thin fingers rose to touch the collar around her neck, a gesture I had seen before.

“Your…husband? is the captain of the High Liege’s guard, isn’t he?”

Her eyes flew wide. “How did you know? Is he… That beast hasn’t… He can’t be dead, or I would be too.”

“No, don’t be alarmed. I chanced to meet him, that’s all, some time before I encountered Master Roseman. He’d turned his gem to the back, but…” I touched my own collar lightly, though I was already coming to hate the thing. “’Tis an unusual ornament, and I noticed.”

“Did he appear well?” Her hands clenched on her napkin.

“Yes, though I thought him a trifle brusque with my request. Haven’t you seen him recently?”

How long had Roseman been holding her here?

“We’re allowed to meet once a month,” she said. “For an hour. Sometimes longer, if Gervase has been ‘behaving.’”

“Well, now I understand why he brushed off my complaints of corruption in the town. I was surprised at that, in a servant of the High Liege.”

I dropped a spoonful of honey in my tea and stirred, hoping a more conversational tone might let her relax, for she was strung as taut as a lute. Small wonder, with her very life dependant on her distant husband’s “good behavior.”

This time, her smile seemed more real.

“The Liege had heard rumors of corruption in Tallowsport. He sent Gervase because he was certain of his honor and his loyalty. Along with a senior judicar, to look into the matter. When the judicar met with an ‘accident,’ the Liege believed Gervase’ report that it
was
an accident. Because he trusted him.” Her lips tightened. “We had only been married for a year.”

What had it cost a trusted man to choose between love and honor? I had no blame for his decision, for there was a lady—now traveling with a troupe of players in the northern parts of the Realm—who was…now my dear cousin, and nothing more.

But that had been her choice, freely made—not a criminal’s use of extortion and magic.

“Are we the only people here, besides Roseman’s guards and servants?”

“Yes, though he brings house parties, sometimes. In spring and summer for horse racing, and hunting parties in the fall. He’s usually doing business with his guests, as well. I’m expected to stay out of their way.”

“How long have you been here?” I asked.

“Almost two years.” She took a sip of tea, and I noticed that she hadn’t even tasted the meager slice of toast on her plate.

“’Tis a long time.” I looked up the table to where Roseman’s thugs ate their breakfast, ignoring us. “You haven’t gotten to know any of your guards?”

“I tried at first,” she said. “But the Rose’s men are as loyal as he claims. He pays well, and he chooses them well too. I didn’t find one I could bribe. And my husband’s visit that month was cancelled.”

It sounded like a small thing, unless you saw her mouth tremble.

“Roseman will pay for his cruelty,” I promised her. To her, and the orphans, too. “For all the evil he’s wrought, for all his victims.”

And if that meant Fisk must grieve for Jack Bannister, so be it. None who served the Rose were innocent.

“Then I hope you brought an army,” she said. “And that you don’t care much for your…wife, mayhap?”

“Not a wife. Fisk is my friend…”

I hesitated, for I didn’t wish to have this woman who needed an ally so badly think me a lunatic. But it had never been more true than at this moment.

“Fisk is my friend, and my squire,” I finished firmly. “I’m a knight errant, in search of adventure and good deeds.”

Her jaw dropped and she shrank from me, as anyone might from a stranger who made so ludicrous a claim. But then her eyes met mine, searching. I know not what she found, but her whole face brightened as she laughed. And for the first time, I saw why a man might love this woman more than honor.

“Then good luck to you, sir knight. I’m afraid you’ll need it.”

“My name is Michael.” And since I had observed her eyes as well, I added gently. “I couldn’t help but notice…do they drug you?”

Those dilated eyes flashed up, and a bit of color warmed her pale cheeks.

“No. Not the way you mean. I don’t have the right disposition for a prisoner, I’m afraid. These last few years, I’ve had a hard time sleeping. Master Roseman is generous enough to provide me with a sedative. Well, my husband insisted, because after a while I was falling apart.” She took another sip of tea. “The effects linger, in the morning. By luncheon I’ll be fine.”

She might also be addicted to laudanum for the rest of her life—yet another hold the Rose would have on her and her spouse.

Generous be hanged.

“My mother is a skilled herb talker,” I said, using the country phrase for those who know how to safely harvest and brew magica plants. “She taught me a great deal. Mayhap I can make you a tisane that will let you sleep without so many side effects.”

She was so fearful, so unhappy. Without even thinking, I sent a wave of calmness surging through my animal handling gift…and felt the lid slide off the bright pool of magic, which ever since I drank Lady Ceciel’s potions has lived somewhere inside me.

Or mayhap ’twas always there, and her potions just uncovered it. Whatever the case, I saw the tense muscles in my new friend’s neck relax for the first time since I’d met her.

“I’m Lianna,” she said. “And if you could brew something else to help me sleep, I’d appreciate it. Master Roseman’s potion works, but it makes me dizzy and I feel so…heavy in the morning.”

I had a notion that I could push my gift further, with magic and will, and she’d grant me the trust I needed then and there. But if I did that, I wouldn’t deserve her trust. I willed the lid that covered my magic shut. And if part of me was sorry for it, as some of her tension returned, I knew I’d done her nothing but good.

Surely such small bits of magic as this, which I’d been using on and off for months, wouldn’t drive me as mad as that poor jeweler.

“You don’t believe I’m going to stop the Rose,” I said. “There’s no reason you should. But we’re going to help you, my squire and I.”

Which meant I’d best find some way to communicate with Fisk, for I had no doubt he was plotting and scheming just as I was. And the way our luck was running, I’d put high odds on each of our schemes foiling the other if we couldn’t coordinate them.

That was what the Rose was counting on, after all. But I know full well that betting against Fisk’s cleverness is a serious mistake.

No guard was set on my door that night—which told me that even if I escaped, Michael was out of my reach.

And looking out my window at the guards who patrolled the grounds all night, just getting myself out of the house might be tricky. Tony Rose appeared to have an unlimited supply of guardsmen, and I wondered what they were there to protect. We hadn’t found out where he kept his money. But the thought of lifting a bit of that vast fortune had barely passed through my mind before I rejected it. Which tells you what a tight spot we were in.

On awakening, I opened my shirt collar to make sure the glowing stone was visible, and then went down to the kitchen to ask about breakfast. None of them followed me, but every guard I passed looked at my throat.

By the time I reached the kitchen my appetite was fading. It all but vanished, when the cooks told me I was to join “the boss” for breakfast.

I followed a tray of jam-filled pastries up the stairs to, not a dining room, but to Tony Rose’s office. Unlike the carefully staged study, this was a room where work was done. The massive desk was covered with correspondence, bills of lading, and what looked like the text of a city ordinance. Several changes had been marked in the margins.

The boss was working as he ate, his plate on top of a stack of letters. Jack was still in attendance, and so was another man, with the rugged face and wiry build of a dock worker. His worn leather vest and boots resembled that of the guardsmen, but despite the scars across his knuckles his hands were stained with ink, and he’d abandoned his own plate to take notes for his employer.

Roseman waved me toward half a dozen trays that sat on a chart table, which was almost as cluttered as the desk so the trays rested on scattered city maps, books, and more loose papers.

I picked up a plain pastry and a cup of tea, and listened till the Rose finished giving orders for the food trains to purchase fifty more oxen, and arranged to meet with a rope maker to see if the man could justify the price he was charging for cordage.

The rope maker would no doubt be charging less by the interview’s end.

I expected the secretary to rise and leave when he finished making notes, but he put down the pen and reached for his cooling plate.

The Rose pointed to a chair, and I sat.

“This is Ugg Wiederman.” He nodded to the stranger, whose mouth was full. “He’s in charge of my operations here in the city, just like Jack’s in charge of operations outside. First, you take my orders. Second, you take theirs. Got it?”

Jack had said he was “an expediter” for his employer. No wonder he’d felt free to offer me a job.

“Suppose their orders contradict each other?” I asked. If the one who wasn’t top dog resented it, rubbing a little salt in that wound might be useful.

“Then you’ll take Jack’s orders. Your job is at the port, but it deals with outside operations. So Jack’s in charge of you.”

“Will he be punished if I fail? What a tempting thought.”

Jack grinned at me, and for a moment years and betrayal all fell away. I’d forgotten that rare, open grin.

“Jack’s not the one who’s hostage for your good behavior.” Roseman eyed me critically. “I don’t mind smart-ass cracks, as long as they amuse me. When I stop being amused…”

I nodded and took a bite of pastry, mostly to show him I wasn’t intimidated. My throat was so dry I had to wash it down with a sip of tea.

“So, what is my job?”

Tony Rose was still staring at me, in a way that was cursed unnerving.

“Some of my ship captains are spending more money than they’re making,” he said finally. The fact that he knew that much about his employees was a warning in itself. “I think they’re skimming. Not on the cargoes—I’ve got clerks with them who keep track of that. But the captains dispose of smaller items for me, in sales that don’t usually have receipts. You know what I mean?”

He meant loot from people like the wrecking gang who had sunk so many ships in Keelsbane Bay. Loot from bandits, burglars, and other criminals all over the south coast. Maybe the whole United Realm.

My estimate of the Rose’s fortune grew yet again. Knowing that the goods you stole will never be traced back to you is worth a considerable cut of the take.

“Have you sent a clerk to audit their ledgers?” I asked.

“Not yet,” said the Rose. “Because I don’t employ idiots. They’re going to have a second set of ledgers for those transactions—or if they’re really smart, no records at all. Skim a bit of profit off the top, tell me they got the best deal they could, and put what they’re giving me down in the books. Just a bit of extra coin in their purse, that’s all. Though the way some of them are spending, it’s more than a bit.”

“That’s an amateur’s mistake,” I said. “They should spend it in other ports. Or better, bank it in some other city, under another name, and leave it untouched till they’re ready to quit and claim it.”

“Yeah, well, they’re ship captains,” said Tony Rose. “At scamming, they are amateurs. Which is where you come in.”

Because I wasn’t.

“You want me to find their real ledgers? Assuming they kept them.”

“I’m assuming they didn’t keep records,” the Rose said. “They may be amateurs, but I don’t hire fools. I want you to go in as a clerk, new to my employ, running a standard audit. I audit people all the time, so they won’t find that suspicious. When you find something wrong in the ledgers—every ledger has something off in it, even if they’re honest—I want you to make a big deal out of how you’ll report it, and what I do to men who cheat me.”

“Ah.” The light dawned. “You want them to bribe me.”

“Accomplishes two things,” said the Rose. “If they come to me and report you, I’ll be pretty sure they’re honest after all. If they don’t, that means they have something to hide.”

I thought that even an honest man might not want to bet on the Rose’s mercy—but this was one of those times when a smart crack wouldn’t be wise.

“If they don’t report you,” the Rose went on, “once you’ve taken their bribe you can work your way into their organization. Demand to know what’s going on, tell them you can help them get better deals in several ports, offer—”

“I know how to work my way in,” I said. “When I know the whole set up, everyone involved, then I report back to you?”

It wasn’t a bad scheme. I bet I knew who’d come up with it, even if Roseman thought it was all his own idea.